A. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to electronic commerce and, more particularly, to an apparatus and methods for determining consumer demand for goods and services such as travel-related products. This invention also relates to an apparatus and methods for distributing information reflecting consumer demand for goods and services to multiple suppliers capable of supplying the goods and services in demand for the purpose of packaging goods and services and offering those packages to the consumers.
B. Description of the Related Art
The Internet has been hailed the marketplace of the future, a result of its accessibility and usability. A computer equipped with a communication mechanism such as a modem and telephone connection is nearly all that is necessary to gain access to the Internet. A program called a browser, such as the Netscape Navigator from Netscape Corporation, makes it a simple task to traverse the vast network of information available on the Internet and, specifically, its subpart known as the “World Wide Web.”
The architecture of the Web follows a conventional client-server model. The terms “client” and “server” are used to refer to a computer's general role as a requester of data (the client) or provider of data (the server). Under the Web environment, Web browsers reside in clients and specially formatted “Web documents” reside on Internet (Web) servers. Web clients and Web servers communicate using a conventional protocol called “HyperText Transfer Protocol” (HTTP).
In operation, a browser opens a connection to a server and initiates a request for a document. The server delivers the requested document, typically in the form coded in a standard such as the “HyperText Markup Language” (HTML) format. After the document is delivered, the connection is closed. The browser displays the document or performs a function designated by the document.
Every day, more people gain access to the Web, and every day, more of them are shopping online. Online shopping provides a level of convenience they want, need and will soon demand. Electronic commerce or “e-commerce” is the term often used to refer, at least in part, to online shopping on the Web. E-commerce is a unique opportunity for businesses of any size. E-commerce can expand a company's marketplace-and consequently, its customer database. By simply providing a Web server having information on the company's product offerings and the customer database, and linking the Web server to the Web, the company can track visits, sales, buying trends and product preferences—all at the customer level. The company can then present its customers with products they are most likely to buy—on an individual basis. For this reason alone most marketing professionals consider the Web to be one of the best direct marketing tools.
But the number of retailers with online stores is growing exponentially every year, making it increasingly difficult for online shoppers to navigate the Web to locate particular products at the best prices. This challenge for consumers also introduces a problem for merchants in designing campaigns to attract consumers to the merchants' Web sites and away from their competitors' sites.
Certain known business methods, and conventional implementations of those methods on the Internet, give consumers greater control over a business deal by permitting consumers to request products and services and set the price they are willing to pay for those products and services, such as travel products like airfare, car rentals, and similar travel commodities. See, for example, systems disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,794,207 and 5,845,265. One example of this type of business method is currently available on the Internet at the Uniform Resource Locator (“URL”) www.priceline.com. Priceline.com claims to communicate consumer demand for products and services derived from the requests directly to suppliers or to their private databases. Consumers agree to hold their offers open for a specified period of time to enable priceline.com to fulfill their offers from inventory provided by the suppliers. By requiring consumers to be flexible with respect to suppliers, priceline.com claims to enable suppliers to generate incremental revenue without disrupting their existing distribution channels or retail pricing structures. But this approach fails to recognize the importance of the information on consumer demand that is not satisfied by the inventory provided by the suppliers.
Other business methods, and conventional implementations of those methods on the Internet, also collect demand but for a different purpose. One conventional approach (currently located at the URL www.accompany.com) collects demand for a particular product or service for the purpose of securing increased savings on that product or service based on the demand. For example, using this approach one to five consumers would obtain a particular discount on a product but if an additional consumer also seeks to obtain the same product then all six consumers would obtain a further discount. Like the priceline.com example, this too fails to recognize the importance of the information on consumer demand that is not satisfied by the inventory provided by the suppliers.
There is therefore a need for a system that can attract more consumers to a Web server by delivering products and services based on demand collected from consumers but not otherwise satisfied by suppliers. Such a system not only permits the server to expose more consumers to its products and services but also it permits the server to expose an increasing number of consumers to information such a as advertisements for products and services.